‘But your tea!’ I said. Somehow, I didn’t relish the thought of being left alone with Shayak just then.
Mr Chakravarty shook his head. ‘My missus will be waiting for me at home! We have a lunch invitation.’ Shayak stood up. ‘No need for you to come with me, Shayak. You young people finish,’ he said, waving him back down in his seat.
‘I’ll walk you to your car,’ he said. He then looked at me, and in a voice so low that only I could hear it, said, ‘Don’t run away now.’
I have to admit that I did contemplate it. But perhaps I didn’t really want to move. Perhaps the spring rolls were too tasty for me to abandon them. Perhaps I was tired—my back did ache a bit—from all that fake golfing. Perhaps hearing Mr Chakravarty refer to the man I knew as Shayak as ‘Shayak’ had lulled me into a false sense of safety. Whatever it was, by the time I began to seriously consider it, it was too late for me to flee. I saw Shayak returning, crossing the room with long strides. In a moment, he was sitting in his chair, black, black eyes boring into mine.
‘Truth time,’ he said.
‘What? Shouldn’t that be my opening line?’
‘Perhaps,’ he said, not ruffled in the least. ‘But I got there first.’
‘You are Mayank Gupta’s brother?’ I asked.
I was happy to note that he looked at least a little unsettled by this. ‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Why didn’t you mention it earlier?’
‘You didn’t ask.’
‘But you lied!’
‘Did I? No, I am fairly certain I never lied.’
My mind was a mess. I tried to remember at least one thing that this man had actually lied about. ‘What about all that venture capitalist stuff?’
‘Well, my brother is a venture capitalist, and I am representing him. So that is my job for now. I was here on my brother’s behalf even before his prickly ex-partner very inconveniently got himself murdered.’
That was a shamefully thin explanation. But I had more important questions at hand. ‘Why ex-partner?’
‘Little known fact. My brother and Prakash Agarwal had parted ways some time ago. It seems Agarwal hadn’t bothered to mention it to anyone.’
That explained the silence from Hong Kong. ‘Why are you here then?’
Here Shayak paused. ‘There were business matters to tie up and I am … somewhat better equipped to handle the situation than my brother. He is far too soft to have dealt with Agarwal with a firm hand. And once Agarwal was dead there was even less reason for him to be here.’
I tried to think of a reason why this wasn’t an acceptable answer. Mayank Gupta was not wanted by the law. And just in case there were any issues, his brother was here to represent him and was clearly in touch with the police.
‘Who are you?’ I asked.
‘I think I just gave you the answer to that. The real question is, Reema Ray, who are you?’
‘I am not the one keeping secrets,’ I said, acutely aware that he still had not answered my question.
‘Aren’t you? What do you have to do with Mrs Agarwal, exactly? Why did she choose you to confide in?’
My jaw almost dropped. How could he know that? ‘As a journalist, she thought I might have information, that’s all. She was in the dark about her husband’s death, for heaven’s sake.’
‘And your being a trained detective has nothing to do with it?’
I paused and stared. ‘How did you know that?’ I coughed out.
‘Later.’
‘Fine. How is it relevant?’
‘Had it ever occurred to you that Mrs Agarwal might have been using you? That she needed certain information not for her peace of mind, but for a more insidious reason?’
I sat there stony-faced. Of course it had.
‘What kind of a position would you be in now, Reema, had she been the killer?’
I opened my mouth to protest, but Shayak put his hand out and stopped me. ‘I know it isn’t her. But it was a very distinct possibility at the time you chose to get involved, and you had no evidence to the contrary.’
I was surprised by the words and the vehemence with which they were delivered. I felt my hackles rise. ‘I didn’t break any laws and I didn’t hurt anybody.’
‘What about Mallika? Is she your villain or your hero? And what will she think of you now that you’ve unearthed her deepest, darkest secrets?’
‘How do you know about that?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Of course it does,’ I yelled. My mind was racing, and my face was burning, but Shayak was not finished yet.
‘A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing, Reema. Isn’t your ex-boyfriend’s wife’s disappearance enough to teach you that valuable lesson?’
His voice was cold and clinical; mine was now a cracked whisper. ‘How much do you know about me, exactly?’
‘Enough.’
‘Well, how do I know it wasn’t you?’
Shayak smirked. ‘If it were me, I would have killed you that first night I met you in the bar, after you left Mrs Agarwal’s house.’
In a flash it all made sense. He had followed me! In fact, he had been following me all along!
It was as though he could read my mind. ‘And you were wrong about another thing: it is extremely unlikely that you’d bump into an acquaintance not once but thrice within days in a city of fourteen million people.
‘But it is a funny old world,’ he continued. ‘Because this meeting—well, it really was a coincidence.’
‘Sorry, but you are wrong on that front,’ I said, standing up and throwing some money down on the table. ‘This time it was I who followed you. Perhaps you’d care to explain what you were doing at Aloka Mohta’s house?’
‘As I said, Sharma is an old friend. What were you doing there? Is it possible you were spying for your former lover? The one that you happened to be harbouring till very recently?’
The fury rose up to choke me as I turned and walked away as fast as I could.
I left the golf course and had to walk for a kilometre or so before finding a cab, but my anger propelled me with speed. By the time I was off my feet, Shayak’s message was clear—I had been reckless, endangering myself and, more importantly to Shayak, possibly the investigation with my ill-advised snooping.
Now, more than ever, I wanted to talk to Mallika Mitra. I tried her number again, in vain. Why wasn’t she taking my calls? Why didn’t her friends seem to know her whereabouts? Had the circumstances been different, I told myself, I would have gone straight to the police with what I had learnt some time ago. But I knew there would be no controlling what happened afterwards.
But Shayak was wrong: I still could help here. And there was only one thing left for me to do: track Mallika down.
It was lunchtime at Khana Khazana. Vineeta was behind the counter, flipping through a book, and she didn’t notice me approach over the bustle of mealtime chatter and cutlery striking the plates and doors swinging shut—the rhythmic music of a restaurant.
‘Vineeta,’ I said, stopping in front of the cash counter behind which she was perched, dressed in a lavender crepe sari, silver earrings dangling from her ears, hair pulled tightly back from her face. Luckily, her husband was nowhere to be seen.
She looked up and, for a split second before the smile came, her eyes narrowed.
‘Reema,’ she said. ‘What brings you here? Not lunch, I suppose.’
‘No, not today, Vineeta. I need to have a word with you.’
‘This isn’t a good time, really,’ she said.
‘I didn’t think it would be. But I think you know where Mallika is.’
‘Why would you think that?’
‘Why did she leave so suddenly?’
‘I don’t know.’ She held her hands very still. I knew she was lying.
‘Perhaps you could hazard a guess.’
‘I don’t see why I should answer any of your questions.’
‘Vineeta, she’s your friend. All I want to do is help
her. And I think you know a lot more about her than you have let on. Like what happened between her and Prakash Agarwal all those years ago.’
Vineeta’s kohl-lined eyes widened, and her veneer of civility slipped for just a second to reveal a deep vein of panic. She stood up and looked around quickly. There were far too many people too close at hand, and though I had spoken in barely a whisper, it was undoubtedly wiser not to carry on this conversation in public.
‘Come with me,’ she hissed, walking towards the wide doors that led to the kitchen. She ushered me in after her, her confused staff watching as we disappeared through another door after that. The room was in darkness, but as soon as Vineeta closed the door behind us the aroma told me where we were. The shelves lining the narrow space in which we stood were laden with the essentials of every Indian kitchen: spices. And when Vineeta flipped on a light, I saw that underneath them were vats of provisions—dals, rice, flour. Despite the ugliness that had brought me here, I couldn’t help taking in an extra lungful of their combined perfume.
‘How do you know about that?’ Vineeta whispered.
‘It was a police case. It wasn’t so hard to find out. She shared it with you, didn’t she? That is why you got so defensive when your husband mentioned him that night at the dinner.’
She nodded slowly. ‘The only reason she told me was because we were close to the Agarwal family a few years ago. Mallika warned me that leaving my daughter alone with him would not be a good idea.’
‘But you were on good terms with him after that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘Why not? Who Mallika likes and doesn’t like isn’t the sole determiner of who I associate with.’
‘He’s a friend.’
‘Yes.’
‘And that doesn’t affect your relationship with Mallika?’
‘Whatever happened with Mallika was twenty-five years ago. And it was never proven. In some way, it was her word against his.’
‘You believe him?’
‘It’s not like that!’ she said. And then, it was as though she finally remembered who I was. ‘Anyway, I don’t see how any of this is your business.’ Her mouth was a snarl of contempt.
‘I told you—I need to know for my article.’
‘You write about food, Reema, not murder.’
‘Not this time. So, you can either tell me what you know or put me in touch with Mallika. Or I will have to print whatever information I have, and it won’t look good for your friend.’
‘You don’t understand,’ said Vineeta.
‘Explain it to me.’
‘When Mallika’s marriage hit a rough patch, she blamed Agarwal.’
‘Why?’
‘She said that she had never been able to trust men after what he had done to her. When she and Siddhartha couldn’t have children, he wanted to adopt. She refused. She said it never felt right. I don’t think she ever got over it. And Agarwal wouldn’t back down, even for a moment. But I never thought she would go this far.’
‘You believe Mallika killed Agarwal?’
I saw a flash of hesitation in her eyes. ‘I don’t know what I believe.’
I would get nothing more from Vineeta. She was already moving away from me, towards the narrow door of the pantry. As I turned to leave, I saw through the corner of my eye a shelf of spices, the new labels on their green-and-orange jars peering out at me. It looked as though there were enough saffron in there to cover a small field. Beauty blooms in the unlikeliest of places.
As we stepped out of the pantry, I cringed. There before me was Manish Solanki. He looked from my face to his wife’s with surprise. ‘Did I interrupt something?’
I shot Vineeta a look, and she hardly seemed capable, in that moment, of coming up with a plausible reason for the two of us hanging out in the pantry. ‘No, Vineeta was just showing me the lovely batch of saffron you have in stock.’
‘It’s very expensive, you know.’
‘Yes, I am aware of that.’
‘And it’s real. From Kashmir. None of that fake stuff that most people use.’
I smiled, too exhausted to care.
‘You better write that down. Don’t you go printing lies about our restaurant.’
‘Manish, she isn’t here to write about us.’
He gave a snort. ‘No, of course not. We don’t sell pig dumplings, do we?’
‘Perhaps you should try castor bean halwa instead. That would make it into the news, no?’ I said with a smile.
‘Very funny, Reema,’ said Manish, finally cracking a grudging smile. ‘Why make the lifestyle pages when I can make headlines by killing my wife’s customers?’ Like every bully, he backed off when pushed back.
I turned to his wife. ‘Goodbye Vineeta,’ I said.
Vineeta looked disgusted with both of us, and gave me only a cursory nod of dismissal.
eighteen
I felt like I wasn’t thinking straight. Between Aloka and Agarwal, the magazine and the mystery, my overloaded head was simply unable to sort and file and analyze in the manner it was used to.
I could think of only one activity that would help me recalibrate: baking. And lightweight muffins or brownies, the kind that I could handle in my kitchenette, simply would not cut it. I needed to pull out the heavy-duty baked goods.
I called my mother. ‘Ma, can I use your kitchen tonight?’
‘Only if we can eat what you are cooking.’
‘It will be dessert. And it might be a little bit late. Is that okay?’
‘If you have to ask about that, you don’t know your mother at all.’
She promised to organize dinner. I headed to the grocery store to get my supplies. And then I rushed to my mother’s house as quickly as I could. I let myself in and was almost taken down by Batul’s enthusiasm and girth. The next fifteen minutes were spent scratching the retriever’s demanding belly, then I headed to the kitchen. For the next few hours, Batul aside, I would have the house to myself. Exactly what I needed.
It wasn’t often that I worked up the courage to attempt puff pastry. But I knew the theory well enough, and I was in the mood to be patient. I began by bringing the dough together as delicately as possible, before stashing it in the fridge. Then, with Batul passed out at my feet, I pulled my notebook out of my bag and started to jot down my thoughts.
Unlike my pastry, there were no clear steps to solving a murder. And I had too many suspects with too many motives and decidedly too little evidence.
A man was dead. Poisoned.
The wife had once accused her husband of attempting to extort dowry. She admittedly disliked him, if not hated him.
And then there was this ancient accusation of molestation. Where did that leave Mallika and her husband?
What about the Solankis? Hateful Manish. Cold Vineeta. Undercurrents with every word spoken.
I had at least ruled out business partner Mayank Gupta and Shayak. Dhyan I had never considered as a suspect. He had brought me a piece of evidence, which he had had no need to do. It was a different matter that I was convinced that the evidence had nothing to do with the murder of Prakash Agarwal.
I left my notepad and returned to my pastry. The dough was cool enough to work with. I took it out and shaped an obscene amount of butter into a square. I rolled out the dough into a rectangle and wrapped it in the dough and then began to slowly, painstakingly, roll again.
I rolled and folded, folded and rolled. As my pastry began to take shape, ideas came together in my head. About both Aloka and Agarwal. And then I put the dough in the freezer to rest once again before heading back to my notes. Then another round of rolling, as I ignored the ache in my arms. The amount of discomfort I could endure now was directly proportionate to how good the end product would be; an unfathomably complex result of skill, patience and a good deal of chemistry. Every mouthful should be light and rich all at once, and the eater would never know the effort that had gone into it.
The skilled chef knows neve
r to take simplicity for granted.
Just like the skilled detective. Every crime is as flawed as the people who commit them, and it is usually the most predictable people who are the perpetrators, acting for the most predictable reasons. But when it all came together, sometimes the mechanics were difficult to recognize; hidden under layer after layer of light-as-air deceit.
I heard the main door open. The ladies were home.
‘I smell pizza,’ I yelled out. Not the gourmet precursor I had expected for my dessert.
‘Yes, but it’s the good stuff. We stopped by Fire & Ice.’
‘Great. It’s going to be a rich dinner.’
‘Which is why we have some very light white wine to give it company,’ shouted my mom from the living room.
Hema Masi walked into the kitchen. ‘Ooh, Reema, puff pastry? That’s very impressive.’
‘Try it first before you decide that.’
‘I am sure it will be lovely. What are you making?’
‘It’s a surprise.’
‘How long will it be?’ asked my mother.
‘Not long now. I’ll put it together at the end, after dinner.’
‘So come and sit with us.’
‘Soon.’
I had begun to lose my pleasant concentration when luckily my mother cracked open the wine and she and Hema Masi retreated to the living room, leaving me alone, once again, with my thoughts.
It was back to the fridge one last time. As I stashed the pastry in the fridge, I turned my attention to the cream. After all that trouble over the pastry, I was going to keep the filling simple. I added sugar and a few drops of vanilla extract to the cream and turned on the electric beater. Once it had turned into a pillow of goodness, I stashed it in the fridge and took the pastry out. More rolling and folding followed before it was finally ready for the oven. I briefly joined the ladies for my slices.
‘What did I miss?’ I asked, grabbing my Fire of Bengal and taking a sip of wine.
‘Another shopping spree,’ said my mother.
‘This time, it was only gift s from New Market.’
After dinner, they showed me the day’s loot before I retreated to the kitchen to finish up dessert. I cut the pastry and popped it into the oven. Then I chopped up the strawberries, which were too tart to do without some sugar. Soon, I was assembling my mille-feuilles.
The Masala Murder: Reema Ray Mysteries Page 19